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2 stars, Annie Barrows, books, epistolary novel, first time read, Mary Ann Shaffer, own book, read in 2019, reading, review, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Title: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Author: Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
First published: 2008
Dates read: 22.-24.4.2019
Category: first time read, own book
Rating: 2/5
The book in five words or less: sweet but superficial
My thoughts:
In 1946, writer Juliet Ashton receives a letter from a Guernsey pig farmer. The man, Dawsey, has come to possess – and love – a book she used to own. The two of them start up a correspondence and through their letters, Juliet gets to know and love the island and Dawsey’s friends, the members of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. Juliet, who is suffering from writers’ block and looking for a topic for a new book, is fascinated by how the individual book club members lived during the war, and how they as a group and individually dealt with the German occupation of the Channel Islands. In time, she develops a friendship with the book club members and eventually even visits them on Guernsey.
Now, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is a book beloved by many (not least of all thanks to the recent movie), and I feel almost bad saying that I really do not get what the hype is all about. Granted, Romance is not my preferred genre, but I don’t think my disappointment is based on this book being the ‘wrong’ genre.
In fact, I like the premise and the setup of the novel. The war-time Channel Islands are a topic I know nearly nothing about, and I’m also generally curious about the epistolary genre. Very often, epistolary novels turn out rather quick reads for me, especially if the letters in question are rather short, as is the case with The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. It is hardly surprising, then, that I practically flew through the book and I also did genuinely care about the island’s history during the war and the different characters’ backstories.
However, in the end the book fell flat on both accounts. While Juliet has a rather distinct writing voice, everyone else sounded very much the same. In fact, most of the (side) characters remain extremely flat, one-dimensional, and generally underdeveloped. We barely know anything about some of the members of the Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (Amelia, the German soldier Elizabeth fell in love with, Dawsey – ironic given that he’s the first person Juliet corresponds with), while other characters are limited to caricatures (Mark, Adelaide). Moreover, most of the letters by the less well-known island inhabitants feel like they are just there to add historical colour and read a little like info-dumping.
I also did not really get why everyone was so obsessed with Elizabeth. She was introduced as a potentially interesting character, but the fact that I was always told how everyone loved her instead of actually shown reasons why they did meant that in the end I wasn’t really convinced. I also thought she was a little too perfect and too beloved, especially given that she made some really dumb decisions.
Additionally, I thought the conflicts in the book were resolved way too easily and at too little emotional cost, something I found particularly troubling regarding those related to the war. One striking example of this is the case of Remy, a French concentration camp prisoner who, after a short period of convalescence and one scene that could be interpreted as a PTSD reaction (with a lot of squinting) pretty much carries on with her life as normal and without further consequences. Forgive me, but I do feel uncomfortable when a book about WW2 atrocities feels cute rather than complex.
However, I did feel that the book started out strong and only fell apart in the second half of the novel. Here, I got the distinct impression that the book was trying to be too many stories at the same time: a book about the love of reading, a story about surviving a war and dealing with its aftermath, a love story (no, actually several), a history of island life, and a character study of the island’s inhabitants. (And don’t get me started on the whole detour about Isola’s mysterious letters.) In the end, I felt that the book would have done well with a stronger focus on one or two of those topics instead of trying to cram all of them in barely 240 pages.
Read if you like: the movie, books about island life, cutesy historical colour, epistolary novels